The development that Samantha Fish has gone through from the moment I first saw her in 2015 as a novice touring artist to the confident blues artist who made the Luxor in Arnhem glow is enormous.
A hymn of praise for a fascinating evening.
The Zac Schulze Gang was the support act this evening. Since their success at the Rory Gallagher Tribute festival in Ballyshannon, they have also been a welcome guest in the Netherlands, in fact, they were in the Luxor themselves just two weeks ago.
The fact that they were here as support for Samantha Fish must have had something to do with their support tour with Samantha in the US. That must have been a good experience, so much so that she also asked the Gang to be their support act for this European tour.
Anyone who knows the Zac Schulze Gang knows that they don’t let any grass grow under their feet, so they started off fiery with a revved-up version of Rory Gallagher’s Laundromat followed by Woman, their new single.
Walking the dog and Hole in my pocket are two great songs from their 2023 EP. Dry Spell with a mighty beautiful bass intro by Ant Greenwell shows that the Gang is much more than a band that spreads rough punk blues over their audience.
They proved that they can do that with their version of Dr Feelgood’s She does it right. The end was for a solid version of Gallagher’s Messing with the Kid, which Zac gradually changed into Peter Green’s Oh Well with super guitar playing.
Another top performance and a good warm-up of this blues-rock company.
After a short changeover break, Samantha Fish entered the stage to loud cheers, perfectly dressed as always.
The show opened with a rough start in the form of MC5’s Kick out the jam, followed by Wild Heart from her eponymous breakthrough album. How she wrapped the audience around her finger with her presentation, her gestures and facial expressions was fascinating to see.
Her voice can be called characteristic, but she was very good in voice during this performance, which did not stand out at all, which together with her guitar playing made it a true and beautiful spectacle.
This choice of songs was perfect, a nice cross-section of her oeuvre Better be lonely, with the squeaky guitar riff, Killed or be killed, Chills and Fever all brought self-confidence and conviction.
Things really got going when the guitar box came out. Insiders know that it will be a treat and the version of Bullet proof that we were presented with here contained everything I imagined from a performance by Samantha Fish.
Passion, fire and mercilessly beautiful slide work, which seamlessly transitioned into Miles to go at a murderous pace, what a party!!. After this violence Samantha took her foot off the gas.
The acoustic guitar came out for Charley Patton’s Jim Lee Blues, although here not entirely in tune she left the audience amazed with her guitar skills, a true tour de force. She showed that she can also handle the electric guitar well in Somebody’s is always tryin, in which the solo almost took on prog rock traits.
After this violence she got the audience going again with great slides in Po mattie and then reached the highlight of the evening with a great version of Dreamgirl, with singing that went through marrow and a bone, rhythmically beautifully designed by drummer Jamie Douglas, it was the guitar solo that led to a standing ovation as if the audience had been sitting, I still get goosebumps when I think back to it.
In the encore not surprisingly her most recent single I put a spell on you, but then in Samantha Fishes style, her performance has something steadfast whatever she brings, you recognize her style immediately.
To really close things off properly Zac Schulze came on stage to cross guitars in a scorchingly beautiful duet and whip each other up.
The evening with Samantha Fish was two hours of enjoying a professional and personality. The audience stayed in the Luxor for a long time, impressed by what they had seen.
